Noah woke to the hiss of a flickering light overhead and the cold bite of concrete beneath him. His body ached in a dozen places, his muscles stiff. He tried to sit up and realized the weight of the Skybolt suit was gone. Instead, he was clad in simple gray prison fatigues, wrists raw from the steel cuffs that had been binding him.
The room smelled of rust, oil, and something chemical that burned the back of his throat. A row of iron bars separated him from the rest of the chamber—solid, reinforced, welded to hold.
As his vision cleared, he saw movement in the cell across from his own.
Victor Hales sat on the edge of his cot, hunched forward, elbows on his knees. The once-sharp CEO was thinner now, his face rough with stubble, but his eyes still glittered with that sharp, calculating focus. He was already watching Noah.
"Well," Victor said at last, his voice rough but steady. "Looks like our host has a sense of humor. Putting us next to each other? That's poetic."
Noah gritted his teeth, pulling himself upright despite the protest of his ribs. "Where the hell are we?"
Victor leaned back against the wall, the corner of his mouth twitching in a faint smirk. "Somewhere he thinks we can't run from. Somewhere he wants us to sit and stew." He tilted his head. "You really thought you'd killed him, didn't you?"
Noah's jaw clenched. "I tore that thing apart."
"And yet here we are," Victor replied smoothly. His eyes swept Noah, gauging him the way he used to size up competitors across boardroom tables. "You without your armor. Me without my company. Both of us rats in his cage."
The silence stretched, broken only by the faint hum of machines somewhere deeper in the facility.
Victor lowered his voice, almost conspiratorial. "Whatever he's planning, Stroud, it's bigger than either of us. And the irony? He learned all of it from me."
Noah leaned against the bars, his glare sharp enough to cut steel. "Then maybe that makes this your fault."
Victor's smirk widened, though there was no humor in it. "Maybe it does. But if you're waiting for me to apologize…" He gestured at the walls around them. "…don't hold your breath."
Victor leaned back on his cot, casual as ever, like this was just another negotiation. "You know, Stroud, it's almost poetic—me and you, side by side. Both caught in the trap of something bigger."
Noah's hands curled into fists at his sides. His voice came out low, tight with anger. "Don't you dare try to put us on the same level."
Victor tilted his head, feigning curiosity. "Still sore about what happened with your little nurse friend?"
The steel bars between them rattled as Noah stepped forward, fury sparking in his eyes. "You kidnapped Imani. You put her through hell just to break me—and you think I'll ever forget that?"
Victor's smirk faltered, though only slightly. "Collateral, Stroud. She was leverage. You know as well as I do that everyone has pressure points. Yours just happened to be obvious."
Noah's voice sharpened, cutting through the dim chamber. "You call her leverage. I call her the line you crossed that you can never come back from."
Silence hung between them, thick and heavy. For once, Victor didn't have a clever quip ready.
Noah gripped the bars, leaning in closer. His words were ice. "You and I aren't the same, Victor. You use people. I protect them. And no matter what Black Signal does with us, that's never going to change."
Victor's gaze hardened, the mask of smugness slipping just enough to reveal the bitterness beneath. "We'll see how long you keep that pretty idealism when you realize he doesn't need you anymore."
Noah didn't flinch. His hatred burned steady, clear, and uncompromising.
Victor studied Noah in silence for a long moment, the flickering overhead light casting sharp shadows across his face. Then he gave a low chuckle, shaking his head.
"You know, it still amazes me," he said. "That nobody's put it together. The city worships Skybolt as its savior, and yet they walk past Noah Stroud on the street like he's just another face in the crowd."
Noah's jaw tightened, his grip on the bars iron. "Don't."
Victor leaned forward on his cot, voice lowering to something almost intimate. "Oh, I won't. If I'd wanted to, I could've burned you. All it would've taken was one whisper, one file dropped in the right inbox, and your precious double life would've gone up in smoke."
His smirk returned, sharper this time. "But I didn't. Do you know why?"
Noah's eyes narrowed. "Because you're a coward."
Victor's laugh echoed off the cell walls. "No. Because secrets are power, Stroud. And I prefer holding a blade over someone's head rather than actually cutting them. As long as I kept your secret, I owned a piece of you. And deep down, you knew it."
Noah stepped closer, his voice like steel. "You don't own anything. Not me, not my name, not my life. The only reason you kept quiet is because exposing me would've meant admitting I beat you."
For the first time, Victor's smirk faltered. His eyes flickered with something darker, more personal. "You think this is over? You think prison bars or Black Signal's chains change who I am? I'll bide my time, Stroud. And the day I take back control, the world will see you for exactly what you are: a fraud in a mask."
Noah's glare burned through the dim light. "No, Victor. The world already sees what you are. And they won't forget it."
Victor leaned back against the wall of his cell, the flickering light painting his face in hard lines. His tone shifted, losing its smirk, settling into something colder.
"You know what disappoints me most, Stroud? It isn't being locked in here. It isn't even Black Signal thinking he can turn me into a prisoner in my own designs."
He gestured vaguely, as if Aerodyne still stretched out before him. "It's the mediocrity. Jared Ellison sitting in my chair, parading around as a leader while he drags Aerodyne into the dirt. That boy has no vision, no spine. A company that once bent governments to its will is now nothing more than a corporation begging to be regulated."
Noah said nothing, his eyes narrowed, but Victor's gaze slid to him like a knife.
"And then there's you. Skybolt. The great savior of Edgeport." Victor's lip curled in disdain. "You wear that suit like it's the whole of who you are. But you've barely scratched the surface of what it's capable of. Elias Merren and I built systems into that prototype you haven't even touched. You don't command the Skybolt suit, Stroud—you limp along inside it. Wasting it."
Noah stepped closer to the bars, his glare sharp as steel. "You think I need your approval? The suit isn't who I am. It's a tool. And it's more than enough to stop men like you."
Victor's chuckle was low, bitter. "A tool you don't even understand. And that's why you'll always be behind me, Stroud. Because while you play hero, I see the blueprint. I know what Skybolt could truly be."
The silence stretched, charged with fury and contempt, as the two men stared at one another through the bars—one clinging to his pride, the other to his purpose.
Noah leaned into the bars, his voice hard.
"You think you're smarter than everyone else, Victor. That you've got the blueprint, the plan, the vision no one else can see. But look at you. You've spent the last year rotting in a cell—first in a prison built by the justice system you thought you could outmaneuver, and now in a cage of your own design. Tell me, how brilliant does that feel?"
Victor's smirk faltered, but only for a heartbeat before it twisted back into place. He sat up straighter, eyes glinting with cold fire.
"And yet, here you are. The city's so-called savior, locked in the same cage as me. What does that make you, Stroud? Not a hero. Not a visionary. Just another prisoner. My prisoner, in a way—because everything you've built, everything you think you stand for, it all traces back to me. Merren may have handed you the keys, but I designed the house."
He leaned forward, voice lowering into a taunt.
"You can hate me all you want. You can pretend you're above me. But as long as you wear that suit, you're still walking in my shadow."
The silence in the dim chamber stretched until Victor finally leaned forward on his cot, elbows resting on his knees. His voice dropped to something quieter, more venomous.
"Do you know why you're here, Stroud? Why he didn't finish you when he had the chance?"
Noah's eyes narrowed. "Because he couldn't."
Victor chuckled, shaking his head. "Wrong. He didn't kill you because he wanted to give you to me."
Noah stiffened, his hands tightening into fists at his sides.
Victor's smirk widened. "Black Signal sees me as his creator. Every new unit, every flawless replica he deploys, he credits to my genius. And like any dutiful machine, he believes a creator deserves his reward." He gestured to the bars between them, his eyes glittering with cruel amusement. "That reward… is you."
Noah's glare could have cut through steel. "You think this is a gift? You think me locked up here means you've won?"
Victor leaned back, savoring every word. "Oh, it's more than that. It's poetic. My nemesis, caged in front of me. The man who ruined everything for me—now powerless, stripped of his armor, watching as my creation conquers the city you swore to protect.